


The Life We Knew We Would

by daniomalley



Category: Bandom, My Chemical Romance
Genre: Alternate Universe, Domestic Fluff, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-18
Updated: 2013-03-18
Packaged: 2017-12-05 16:16:15
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,711
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/725280
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/daniomalley/pseuds/daniomalley
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ray's got enough on his plate trying to get Mikey to hang his damn clothes up and do his share of the cooking, he's not sure when he's going to find the time to think of a way to ask Mikey to move in.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Life We Knew We Would

**Author's Note:**

> This was written for no_tags, for the prompt: 'Mikey/Ray, moving in by stealth', and originally posted on 18/1/13. Thanks so much to the mods for running the challenge and making it such a fun experience. Huge thanks to my beta, sylvia_locust, who ensured that Mikey and Ray didn't wind up drinking full cream milk in Walmart's manchester department.

“What’s this?” Ray asked. Mikey had his head stuck in the pantry at the time, looking for pasta spirals because shells always slid off the fork. Of course, Ray didn’t have pasta spirals because he didn’t cook and lived out of takeout containers and mooching meals from his mother.

“What’s what?” Mikey said, giving up on his search and closing the pantry door.

“This,” Ray said, holding out a small black tube. “It was on the counter in the bathroom.”

“It’s my eyeliner,” Mikey said, taking it from Ray’s hand. He slid his glasses off and swiped the eyeliner around his eyes, using the mirrored back of the china hutch Ray kept by the kitchen table because he’d directly inherited his grandmother’s taste in interior design. He examined the result to check that it was satisfactory, and said, “Anyway, Ray, have you been storing your pasta in the saucepan drawer again?”

Ray was looking at him intently and didn’t react to Mikey’s question. “Dinner can wait,” he said, putting his hands on Mikey’s hips and steering him backwards towards the doorway. Mikey grinned and let Ray walk him to the bedroom.

Ray nudged Mikey down onto the bed and rolled him onto his side, rubbing the palm of one hand over the front of his jeans until he moaned. Ray took that as his cue to unzip Mikey’s fly, and dropped down next to him on the bed, his feet up on the pillows so that he could put his mouth around Mikey’s cock. The stimulation made Mikey gasp, and he pressed his head down onto the mattress, holding himself so still and taking everything in. Ray’s groin was a temptation right in front of his face, but before he could think about getting Ray out of his jeans, he reached down and pinned both of Mikey’s wrists in one of his enormous hands. Mikey whimpered and thrust his pelvis forward.

Unable to use his hands, Mikey shuffled forward on the bed so he could put his mouth around the bulge in the front of Ray’s jeans, using his lips and his tongue until Ray moaned and freed one hand to reach down and open his pants. Without the cloth separating them Mikey could use every trick he knew to get Ray off, and every time he did something that worked particularly well, Ray made this _noise_ , a low moan that got louder and higher in pitch each time. Every time, Mikey thought he would come right then and there, but he got competitive about this sort of thing and kept an iron grip on his self control until Ray’s climax hit first.

They never did get around to making dinner that night.

*********

Mikey’s bass had been sitting in a corner of the living room for a week before it occurred to Ray to think it kind of strange. He made a mental note of it so that he could mention it to Mikey when he turned up. Mikey hadn’t said that he would be coming over that night or anything, but he’d stayed over nearly every night that week, so Ray was sort of expecting him.

Sure enough, Mikey arrived straight from work, carrying something wrapped in a battered plastic bag.

“What have you got there?” Ray asked, following Mikey straight to the kitchen.

“It’s a blender,” Mikey said, pulling the item out of its bag. “I know your mom has forbidden you from sharing her salsa recipe, I respect that. But there’s no reason to bug her every time we want some, when you could just as easily make your own.”

“Make my own?” Ray said with a wary glance at the appliance. “That sounds like it would involve cooking.”

Mikey rolled his eyes at him, so Ray added, “I can make an awesome milkshake, Mikeyway.”

“Milkshake?”

“I like milkshakes,” Ray said, a touch defensively, and so of course Mikey relented.

“Chocolate?”

“What else?”

Ray pulled ice-cream out of the freezer and syrup from the pantry. He didn’t have an ice-cream scoop and scooped the ice-cream up with a regular spoon instead. “Say when,” he said, dropping ice-cream into the jug.

“More,” said Mikey. “More.”

“Any more, and it will overflow.” Ray topped the jug up with milk and chocolate syrup.

“So, anyway,” Mikey said a few minutes later, when they were sipping their shakes, “my lease expires at the end of the month. I’m thinking of moving.”

“Your apartment does kind of suck,” Ray agreed. “The hot and cold taps are the wrong way around.”

“Anal retentive,” Mikey mocked, and Ray just rolled his eyes.

“Where are you thinking of moving to?” Ray asked.

There was a brief pause before Mikey answered, “I’m not sure.” He took the milkshake through into the living room. 

Ray followed him, and noticing the bass in the corner reminded him that he’d meant to ask Mikey about it. “Hey, did you know you left your bass here?”

“Yeah?”

“For a week now.”

Mikey shrugged at him. “I play it way more when I’m here than when I’m at home. It just seemed to make sense.”

“But don’t you worry about it?” Ray asked, because he knew his friends gave him shit about treating his guitars like they were his kids, but seriously, he couldn’t imagine leaving one of his instruments somewhere he couldn’t get to it easily.

Mikey just gave him an impassive look. “I know you won’t let anything happen to it.”

That put a warm spot in Ray’s chest that the thickshake didn’t douse.

*************

Mikey had been keeping a change of clothes at Ray’s house for a couple of weeks. It made life a lot easier in the mornings when he overslept and couldn’t remember which of the clothes in his own apartment were even clean enough to wear to work. It was a good system and worked really well until the morning when he woke up and none of his clothes were where he remembered seeing them last.

He confirmed that his clothes weren’t lying on the chair in the corner where he generally left them. They weren’t on the floor, and they weren’t hanging from anything ridiculous like the ceiling fan or the curtain rod. He was facing the probability that he’d left them someplace embarrassing like the kitchen table or the front stoop when Ray walked into the room.

“I can’t find my pants!” Mikey exclaimed, panicky because he’d already been late to work twice that week. (Totally Ray’s fault, he always thought there was more time for morning sex than there actually was.)

In response, Ray went over to the closet and opened the door. “These ones?” he asked, pulling out a hangar with Mikey’s work pants on it.

“Yes!” said Mikey, grabbing them. “Shit. You hung up my pants?” He didn’t add any more, figuring that the ‘why?’ would come through loud and clear.

“Contrary to common belief,” said Ray, in that lecturing tone he got sometimes when he thought someone was being dense, “the floor is not your wardrobe.” 

Mikey looked into the closet and noticed the rest of his clothes hanging up too. “Did you iron this?” he asked, lifting the sleeve of a shirt.

Ray shrugged. “I needed to press some of my things, and it was there,” he said, like there was nothing strange about it. 

Mikey dressed, rushing because he was running late. “I’ll come over tonight?” he said, uncertain even though he’d been happily dropping in unannounced all the time ever since he and Ray had got together. It had been different, before he had his clothes taking up a sixth of Ray’s closet. Now it felt strange.

“I have to go to the store tonight,” Ray said. “I’m out of dish detergent.”

“I can meet you there. At six?”

“Hmm. Remember when our dates used to involve things like live music and Ferris wheels?”

“Not really.”

Ray laughed. “See if I ever take you out again.”

Ray got to the store ahead of Mikey and sent a text message to say he was already inside, so Mikey headed through the doors in search of him, grabbing a basket on his way in and filling it with stuff. Pasta spirals, because Ray was stubborn and wouldn’t pick them up himself. Potatoes, because Ray seemed to think they grew in the bottom of the pantry and never remembered to buy more. More garbage bags, because he’d forgotten to tell Ray that they were out when he’d emptied the bin the night before.

Ray was in the freezer section, comparing expiry dates on cartons of milk. He picked one up and Mikey said “No, that’s skim.”

“Shit.” Ray dropped the milk back onto the shelf and pouted. “The whole milk expires sooner.”

“It’s the price we pay for liking milk that tastes like milk,” Mikey said, grabbing a carton and putting it in Ray’s trolley, along with the things he’d picked up. “Pancake mix is on sale, did you notice?”

Once they’d got everything they needed from the supermarket, they headed back towards the car. Ray paused outside Walmart and looked through the automatic doors thoughtfully.

“Need something?”

“Maybe,” Ray said, although his tone suggested he wasn’t sure. “Mom seems to think I should buy new sheets.”

Mikey thought about the sheets that were on Ray’s bed at that moment. “She might have a point.”

“They’re not that bad!” Ray insisted. “Just because I’ve had them a while...”

“They’re getting pretty worn,” Mikey said gently.

“Mom used the word repellent,” Ray admitted.

They wandered inside and went straight to the Bedding section, where Ray picked up the first set of sheets he saw.

“White?” Mikey said. “They’ll show every stain.” He picked up a different set.

“Black ones are just as bad,” Ray pointed out. “And they fade.”

They surveyed the other options and Ray picked up a few, putting them side by side on a middle shelf.

“The blue ones?” he asked. “Or the green? Or the patterned ones?”

“It’s an ugly pattern.” Mikey dug through the shelves and found a set at the bottom of a stack on the bottom shelf. “These are nice.”

“That’s for a king size.”

“Oh, shit.” Mikey dropped them, disappointed.

“There might be a double set somewhere,” said Ray, but he didn’t sound too hopeful. They went up and down the entire aisle without finding anything. Finally, Ray was going through the sheets on the bottom shelf and seemed to notice something. He reached under the shelf with one long arm and pulled out a set of sheets for a double bed in the pattern Mikey liked.

“I found them!” Ray exclaimed, sounding a little stunned, like he’d found buried treasure or something.

“My hero,” Mikey said, affecting a ridiculous accent.

“Shut up, MIkey,” said Ray, tossing the sheets on top of the shopping cart and turning it towards the counter. “How do you not realise what a stroke of luck that was? It’s totally a big deal.”

“You found them for _meee_ ,” Mikey sang.

“I did,” said Ray. “Because I care, Mikeyway.”

****************

They really should have planned meals before going to the store, Ray thought. Now he had all these ingredients and no idea how to put them together.

“I’ll make some kind of casserole on Friday,” he decided, “and everything that hasn’t been used by then can go in it.”

“You might come to regret that,” said Mikey. “It’ll be a casserole dish full of olives and pineapple.”

“You’ll eat it, and you’ll like it,” Ray threatened. “On Thursday, you should make pasta.”

“Why do I have to make the pasta?”

“Buying it was your idea.”

“I mean, just because I have better taste in pasta, I don’t see why that means I have to cook the pasta...”

“You came along on _my_ grocery run, and filled my shopping cart with stuff I don’t even know _how_ to cook...”

“I paid for half!”

Ray snickered, because winding Mikey up was far too entertaining. “That sorts out all the weekdays,” he said firmly. “And then, on Saturday, we can make those pancakes for breakfast. I assume you’ll be here for breakfast,” he added as an afterthought.

“Of course I’ll be here.”

“And we can get takeout that night. I promised Mom we’d go to her house for dinner on Sunday.”

“Oh, good. Does that mean we’re done?”

“Well...” Ray fiddled with his pen, clicking it even though he knew it drove Mikey nuts. “Yeah, I guess. Hey, have you started looking at apartment listings or anything yet?”

“No, not yet.”

“Okay.” Ray clicked the pen some more, and Mikey reached over and snatched it out of his hands. “I was thinking that, maybe, you should think about moving in. Um. Moving in here, I mean.” Ray sneaked a glimpse at Mikey’s face from the corner of his eye. His expression was blank, neutral. Ray waited but Mikey didn’t say anything.

“It’s just a thought,” Ray added quickly. “Uh. It’s pretty silly actually. You should probably just, um, forget I said that.”

“No,” Mikey said. “No, I’m not going to forget... yes. I’d like to move in.”

“Oh. Oh, good.” Ray smiled. “Yeah. That’s... good.”

Mikey nodded and smiled back.

“We can bring your things over on the weekend, or next weekend, or whenever.”

“Yeah.”

***********

Later that night, after they’d finished the dinner dishes and watched some movie that they’d already seen a thousand times, Mikey was in the bathroom getting ready for bed when Ray passed by the open door.

He stopped in the hallway and looked at Mikey. Mikey watched him in the mirror, quirking one eyebrow at him.

“You’ve moved in already!” Ray exclaimed, pointing a finger at Mikey accusingly.

“What?” Mikey mumbled through a mouthful of toothpaste.

“You totally live here already!” Ray said. “You’re always here. You keep a toothbrush permanently in my bathroom. You live here.”

Mikey rolled his eyes and rinsed his mouth, because this wasn’t a conversation he could have while he was brushing his teeth. “Of course I live here,” he said. “I’ve lived here for weeks. I can’t believe you didn’t notice. I keep my bass in your living room. We just went shopping for food and sheets together, and planned a week’s worth of meals around the assumption I’d be here for all of them.”

Ray gaped at Mikey and waved one hand helplessly. “You didn’t tell me,” he said at last.

“I can’t believe it’s the toothbrush that tipped you off,” Mikey laughed. “That is such a fucking cliché.”

“You are a moving _ninja_.” Ray stepped into the bathroom and pinned Mikey between himself and the counter. 

Mikey put his hands on Ray’s shoulders. “You really didn’t know?”

“I’ve spent the past week trying to think of a way to ask you to move in. I wouldn’t have done that if I had.”

“Oh, God,” said Mikey. “Are there any other incredibly obvious things I should make sure you know?”

“Shut up, Mikey.”

“Water is wet.”

“I said shut up.”

“And fire is hot.”

“Knock it off.” Ray backed his words up by pushing Mikey back against the counter, slipping one firm thigh between his legs. Mikey gasped and ground up against it.

“And the Pope is a Catholic,” Mikey added as soon as he’d recovered.

As his last line of defence, Ray tilted Mikey’s head back and kissed him fiercely on the lips, determined not to stop until every other thought was driven out of his head.

Mikey seemed pretty dazed after the kiss, but he blinked his eyes clear soon enough. “And there’s one more thing,” he said, ignoring Ray’s groan. “I love you.” He held Ray’s gaze, not blinking or wavering. “I just... I need to know that you know that.”

Ray’s hands were still framing Mikey’s face after the kiss, and he moved to stroke Mikey’s cheekbone with one thumb.

“I do know that,” he said. “I know, Mikey. And I love you too.” 

Mikey leaned in to plant kisses along Ray’s jawline, sucking until Ray whimpered.

“Mikey...” he said quietly.

“Mmm?”

“Do we still have to go pack up the rest of your apartment this weekend?”

Mikey laughed and turned Ray in the direction of the bedroom.


End file.
